The Dreamboats and Petticoats brand is well established: at the last count there were five CD collections of 1950s and early 1960s hits. This is where to come for the likes of Del Shannon, Chubby Checker, Dion and the Belmonts, Roy Orbison and Johnny Tillotson. Which is why, in 2009, the TV sit-com writers Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran were asked to come up with the book of a stage musical: some sort of plot to underpin performances of those classic songs. It’s been very successful in London, and the latest tour has landed — petticoats flying, quiffs present and correct — at the New Theatre this week.

Please don’t worry about the plot. Bobby (I Want to be Bobby’s Girl) and Laura (Tell Laura I Love Her) fancy each other (Teenager in Love) — but she’s still a bit young, which leaves him with Sweet Nothin’ and In Dreams. On the horizon are Norman (The Great Pretender) and Sue (who, scene-stealingly, never stops Shakin’ All Over). Amazingly Laura loses her glasses and pigtails, Bobby his reliance on his dad and they write an award-winning song together.

The show must be judged on the music and singing; and after a stilted start — as characters are introduced slightly at the expense of the great songs — the cast quickly find the exuberance gear. Alexis Gerred’s Bobby is spot-on, hitting the Orbison high notes expertly; while Elizabeth Carter (Laura) is the best actor on the stage and grew as a singer (delivering a beautiful pastiche Helen Shapiro song, Dream Baby Dream). A real Shapiro song, You Don’t Know, showed that Amy Diamond as Sue has a lovely voice as well as everything else.

There are a couple of expert acapella songs from the cast (Poetry In Motion and Donna); do please look out for Emma Jane Morton and Rachel Nottingham as flouncy girls who can really play those saxophones. A vital point to make: everyone can sing, dance and play an instrument, and it’s all done for real. The backing band are on stage throughout and behaved and played as if they actually remembered 1961.

At the end, we were on our feet as the cast hit us with Let’s Twist Again, C’mon Everybody, Hey Baby and At The Hop. A parting piece of get-your-head-around-this reviewing: the first song on Monday evening was Let’s Dance, originally done by the great Chris Montez. The last time I was in the New Theatre, at the end of April, who was up on that stage singing that song? Can it be Only Make Believe?

Until Saturday. Box office: 0844 871 3020 (www.atgtickets.com/oxford).